In a similar way that an image can be better than words, I found in this task that words can be more helpful than images.

I was raised here in Canada by European immigrant parents, therefore I learned to read in an Eurocentric culture.  In that culture, titles are expected to come before the rest of the text.  Even though my text is all in images, I did feel the need to maintain that structure.  I found this task similar to a game of charades, including the first image where I tell the reader that my title is of a movie, as opposed to a book or song.  Whereas in the game of charades, I can hear how my audience is interpreting my actions, I am unable to do this here.

I did change the movie that I depicted because I simply couldn’t figure out an emoji or series of emojis to depict “The Score”, so I chose something else, although I almost moved from that as well as I struggled to figure out a non-word emoji for part of the title.  I had already considered how to visualize the plot of either one, but it was the title that was the hardest for me, and it’s much more specific than the wandering plot where I could pick and choose what I want to represent.  I found relying on ideas and emotions was much easier for me than syllables or words when I was representing the movie. As Kess explains, “each of the modes available for representation in a culture provides specific potentials and limitations for communication” (2005, p5). While I was able to represent a complex emotion or idea with one or two emojis, I would often struggle to find one to represent a simple critical word. I am asking the viewer of my image to create and visualize meaning out of seemingly random symbols or images as Bolter describes (2001), but I struggle, without the charades-like feedback, to ensure that my message is being interpreted the way I would be able to with words, or in a multi-modal way that integrates both. Bolter claims that “picture writing lacks nar­rative power” (2001, p. 59) and with the interpretation of an image dependent on the culture and experience of the viewer, misinterpretations are easy.  Having some written words to help give context, or guide the viewer to the correct out of multiple interpretations would be ideal.  I think this is why much of modern literacy is multi-modal, bringing all the benefits of each powerful way of communicating to make “reading” an interpretive experience as opposed to a simple process. In the same way that poets would put onomatopoeia into their work, or use their tone of voice or volume when orally reciting a work to lend emotions and power to the text, it is ideal to be able to choose the best way to send our desired message through multiple modalities.  We can certainly feel limited when required to use just one mode, especially when it is so limited in it’s own vocabulary, like emojis, yet have such a wide variety of interpretation.

References:

Bolter, J. D. (2001). Writing space: Computers, hypertext, and the remediation of print (2nd ed.). Mahwah, N.J: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. doi:10.4324/9781410600110

Kress (2005), Gains and losses: New forms of texts, knowledge, and learning. Computers and Composition, Vol. 2(1), 5-22.

An adventure with your brain

After appreciating the power of the interconnectedness of oral storytelling last week, I was excited to play and create with Twine.  I was hoping that it would allow a more ‘natural’ way of writing, instead of the linear, topical tradition of writing I am used to.  I was hoping this medium would allow my writing to be more similar to what Bush decribes as happening in our brains when he speaks of how “it snaps instantly to the next that is suggested by the association of thoughts, in accordance with some intricate web of trails carried by the cells of the brain (1945, p 106).  Whereas what I was used to in writing is typically more consistent with the idea that “[i]n the static me­dium of print, the writer must normally settle on one hierarchy, one order of topics, although he may find that the topics could be arranged equally well in, say, three orders corresponding to three electronic outlines.’ (Bolter, 2001, p 32). 

This was not my first time playing a Twine, but it was my first creating one.  My struggles with how to take all the paths my brain automatically creates and jumps between and turn it into a viable game through Twine quickly became a daunting task.  I had began trying to make a game that my students could use as a model to show their understanding of the brain’s functioning and fight, flight or freeze response. The three paths that my brain created within a moment quickly became two, and then shrank even more because of the challenges I faced with understanding how to make the path flow as easily as it would have if I was able to orally describe the story.  This made me connect to a specific part of Englebart’s model, the “H-LAM/T system (Human using Language, Artifacts, Methodology, in which he is Trained)” (1963).  I was using my first language, artifacts (although I wish I could have used sound as well), and the methodology of my culture’s storytelling as well as the structure laid out by the tool itself, but it was my lack of training that was the limiting factor this time.  One part of Twine that was for me frustrating was the fact that I couldn’t see all the pieces of story all at once.  I had to try to remember what was in each box based off the title, and because of my lack of training in Twine, this didn’t go well.  So while the power of hypertext is clearly evident in using Twine, I wasn’t sure how to use some of the best features of hypertext. It reminded me again of Bolter as he described the power of an ebook over a physical book because he states that “the eBook turns any text into a hypertext, in which the reader can search for the occurrence of words and phrases throughout the text, so that the whole text becomes immediately available to the reader in a way a printed book is not.” (Bolter, 2001, p 80-81).  Without being able to see the details of my story as a whole text, I struggled to maintain the flow of my ideas in the way that I would have liked.  Was it just lack of training on the tool?  Or was it a disconnect between my thinking and the creation.

References:

Bolter, J.D. (2001). Writing Space: Computers, hypertext, and the remediation of print. Mahway, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Bush, V. (1945). As we may think. The Atlantic Monthly, 176(1), 101-108.

Englebart, Douglas. (1963). “A conceptual framework for the augmentation of man’s intellect (Links to an external site.).” In Hawerton, P.W. and Weeks, D.C. (Eds.), Vistas in information handling, Volume I: The augmentation of man’s intellect by machine. Washington, DC: Spartan Books. Available (as “Augmentation of human intellect: A conceptual framework”)

At the beginning of this task, I thought it would be significantly easier than it was.  Apparently I am out of practice writing manually and tend to type when I have a large amount of text. Within the first half a page, I had to stop using my “special” pen bought for me by my late grandmother for my graduation decades ago for a wider pen with a rubber grip that didn’t hurt my hand as much. By the end of the first page, my elbow was hurting in a way that reminded me of writing exams. I found my thought process very different from when I would be typing. I would change my sentence to fit what I’d already written instead of what I was thinking because of the challenges of going back to change a word. I find I use more paragraphs and text features in my digital writing, but when hand writing I would often realize after the fact that it was a new idea that could be a new paragraph. This reminded me of the planning that went into planning of text and structure for the printing press and how they would have to completely restart if not planned well, whereas mine wasn’t planned, and I was able to let the text flow (Upside Down, Left To Right: A Letterpress Film). The flow of text can come even easier when there is no pressure around editing, adding after the fact, or deleting parts of the text when using a digital form.

There were various errors that occurred during the manual process. There was one error that I scratched out, and another where I didn’t clearly write the letters so I found I simply went over the letters in the correct form more darkly, making it bold. What was most interesting to me was that I would often change a word that I wasn’t sure how to spell to something that I was. Autocorrect is something that I have certainly gotten used to. It made me wonder how many scribes would tweak or change words for various reasons in the texts that they copied (Lamb & McCormik, 2021). Because I was using ink, a form of text technology that isn’t easily changed, I found myself self-editing and changing my writing to avoid dealing with errors in a different way.  If I were using a pencil or if I was typing, I feel my text would have been different in form, text and specific wording.

Knowing how I changed my text based on what I was able to achieve with pen and paper, I feel that my thoughts are more accurately portrayed through digital means than by pen and paper. I appreciate and often write manually, but the fact that I was very easily able to change my original word choice “better” to “accurate” in the previous sentence, whereas I would shift my statement on paper to fit what I’d originally written, shows the potential shift in meaning and expression between mediums. I find myself better able to self correct, reanalyze, and edit my words as I go in a digital form which isn’t as easy in manual writing.

References:

(2021, Sept 27). Upside Down, Left To Right: A Letterpress Film [Video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/n6RqWe1bFpM

Lamb, R., McCormik, J.,  (2021,   May 7,). From the Vault: Invention of the Book, Part 1 [Audio   podcast]. Retrieved from https://www.iheart.com/podcast/stuff-to-blow-your-mind-21123915/episode/from-the-vault-invention-of-the-82316952/

I annotated Lera Borditsky’s SAR lecture from May 2017 to discuss the question, “Does language shape the way we think?”.

I was very curious about analyzing myself, and literally emptied my bag that I use everyday. I’ve always noticed that I wasn’t like my mom and had a Mary Poppins type bag with everything anyone could ever need tightly stored in perfect pockets of her bag. Mine is much more simple and utilitarian. Mine doesn’t represent my 2 kids, other than the pencil crayon thrown in but I think this is because of their ages (10 and 13) where they don’t need as much from me anymore. I feel that my daily need for most of the things in my bag really represent what I do as a teacher and less as a mom. Having a plethora of pens and highlighters so I can jot down that great idea for a math task is often necessary, even if it ends up as a crumpled piece of paper in the bottom of my bag like the one I found. Having coloured pens and highlighters for giving feedback to kids on their work as I watch my son’s soccer game has also added to the collection. I don’t tend to have a journal or notebook in my bag (too bulky), but a pad of post it notes is often there. If I need more space, I often use random piece of paper (for example the crumpled brainstorm I found was written on the answer key to a math check in I’d given).  It’s just been in the last year that I’ve found need to carry a mask, hand cream and chapstick which are all helpful when dealing with Covid protocols. The stress release essential oil roll on has also come out of the drawer this last year and been very helpful to me when things are getting overwhelming. I found it interesting that I had whiteout in a little pocket of my bag. It’s likely been there for years, and I can guarantee you that it’s never been used! It’s not an item that I use often on the run.

Looking at the items as texts, it’s obvious that I’m a teacher from the words that are scrawled on the papers in my bag as I brainstorm and think of new ways to have my students learn. It says that I value the time and space to jot my ideas down, and that I love the flexibility of a pen and paper for brainstorming over digital forms. The wide range of pens and highlighters also speaks to y use of colour I use as a teacher for feedback and also organizing my own thoughts. 

My phone, which was taking the picture, would likely have a few notifications, reminders, unread texts and emails for both school and home.  So while I enjoy written text, I am fully immersed in digital forms of communication.  My husband and some coworkers would say that I’m too immersed in digital communication and I have been trying to work up the nerve to take my school email off my phone. If you read my texts on my phone you’ll learn that I’m not one to take shortcuts.  Emojis are fine (but not overused), but I text in full sentences with all punctuation, even commas!  No shortcuts with spelling.  Its interesting that there isn’t anything in my bag that would represent my family, my love for crafting or building, or for my love of play volleyball.  But look in my phone, or on my digital platforms and you would certainly see evidence of all of these.  

The text technologies I use most by looking at my bag are pen and paper.  That is often my preference before I digitize anything.  I appreciate the freedom and creativity that I feel when I’ve got some pens and a blank page.  Digital text technologies would be a close second.  You won’t find a computer in my bag because I have 1 in each of my spaces to lighten my load (1 in my classroom, 1 in my office and 1 at home).  My phone which goes everywhere I do is used for so much digital communication from my notes app for to do lists, texting, social media and multiple email addresses.  Looking at all the types of text in my bag, I would say it shows that I appreciate media and digital literacies, but that printed forms of these are still important to me.

Ironically I’ve had this exact bag for over 20 years, and I fill it with much of the same things from when I was in University.  Granted I didn’t have a laptop then, and the texting options were much more limited, but a focus on coloured pens and highlighters, post-its, random brainstorms, to-do lists and notes were certainly still there for small things.  But gone are the big binders and notebooks, now replaced by folders in my Google Drive.

I think an archeologist would look at my bag and see a person who used different forms of text technologies for different purposes. We have so many options, and I use many of them, but each for different purposes. In 2021 many of us are still in transition from traditional print to more digital text, and I think my bag represents this. 

For this task I used the “Voice typing” tool in a google doc.

So hey with 2008 and we had my husband Alex and I we are just decided that we were going to buy my childhood home off of my parents it was a huge house 7000 square feet and it we never finished it was actually a dream house by the by the original owner and they’ve never finished it because they ended up getting divorced and oh my gosh there’s a whole story there to I’m so we bought this unfinished 7000 square foot mansion essentially that had been lived in unfinished for over 40 years by a family well over 30 years by family of 7 so it was well used the particle board flooring was black in the kitchen from all this pills there was no paint on the walls there’s literally spare drywall with the taco spots over the screws there’s primer in a couple of rooms but not many are there’s no Cupboards in the kitchen there was no kitchen sink there’s a sink in the laundry room right beside the kitchen counters no kitchen cupboards like it was fair so Alex did I win Diego was about 3 months old start working on this house trying to fix it up it also had had a roof a very leaky roof that caused huge damage the drywall the roof had already been replaced but the tribal hadn’t so there’s a lot of black mold like it was just disgusting and of course my parents are a little bit of Hoarders so there was just a lot of stuff selected building materials old newspapers and magazines and supplies make my dad’s a does a lot with electronic so there’s a lot of like circuits in that kind of thing all around so trying to make this house livable what’s a lot of Blood Sweat and Tears We Were Young we couldn’t afford to have everything paid for it special for buying the house the only thing we actually got professionally done with the windows installed some Plumbing in the basement and the flooring the hardwood flooring on the main floor cuz he did not want to screw that up but all the painting so much of the Woodworking and like building new walls and drywalling and simple electrical like changing out light to not have stuff. We all learn to do ourselves I learned so much in some of those skills are things I’m still using today light this past weekend I was up helping my my friend repaint his house and put in baseboard and do all the caulking on the doors in the door frame of the some of that is still very useful we kept some of the tools that. How sick I learned how to use Diamond saws to cut huge chunks of marble for a fireplace it was really quite is really quite an experience I learned how to cut tile for backsplash though that was the other thing we didn’t do is we did not hang cabinets kitchen cupboards to this day have no idea how with all of the plates and cups you put in them I’ve no idea how they say on the walls and don’t come crashing down so I was way too paranoid to do that by myself so that was something else that we had to professionally done this house by the end was lovely it was such a lovely home once we put in new showers and replace toilets toilets is actually pretty simple. But doing all of these things turning on one of my favourite Pieces by miss beautiful dresser off of Craigslist and refinishing it and cutting into it and I just in the drawers and putting these beautiful vessel sinks in it and it became our Master vanity with double vanity it was beautiful that is definitely one thing when we sold that house a move to Kelowna that we were really sad that we didn’t get to take with us cuz man not piece was beautiful 

• How does the text deviate from conventions of written English?

My story certainly deviates from written English conventions in a few ways. There are only a few periods in the entire text (only some of them in the correct place), and a complete lack of other punctuation. There are quite a few places where it capitalized a word incorrectly (Woodworking, Pieces, Blood Sweat and Tears etc). Repetitions were also recorded as I may have repeated myself as I collected my thoughts, but ironically not words like “um”. 

• What is “wrong” in the text? What is “right”?

If you studied this text in the way that Ong (2002) talked about, I think you could easily get confused. There were quite a few words transcribed incorrectly, including the first few, which makes understanding my meaning more closely related to detective work than easy study.  “So it was 2008” is much easier to understand that what was transcribed “So hey with 2008”. But much of the descriptions of the work we were doing, or the state of the house was accurate.  The reader’s brain didn’t have the time to process the information since there were no commas or periods to help chunk the information.  So even though much of the story is technically accurate, it is hard to understand and even I took a few times to read through it to understand it enough to see what was ‘off’. 

• What are the most common “mistakes” in the text and why do you consider them “mistakes”?

There are many places where the lack of punctuation makes large errors in the text. By not being able to separate ideas by pausing in speech, or by adding punctuation, it became hard to preserve the meanings, connections and separations. There were also times where the computer misheard me and transcribed incorrectly (for example writing “tribal” instead of ‘drywall’) which also adds a layer of detective work to understanding the story. I’m sure another reader could find more mistakes, or places that make it hard for the reader to understand because even as I re-read, I’m able to put the pauses in since I know the story and where it is going. The mistakes that I see are anything that would cause the reader to struggle to understand my intended meaning.  

• What if you had “scripted” the story? What difference might that have made?

This reminded me of something that came up when I was doing this week’s readings. Ong talked about being able to study written text and not being able to study oral tellings (2002). Text versions of an oral telling are often very different from the original oral story because how I tell a story, and how I write a story will be different in many ways. When I know a reader won’t be able to hear my tone of voice, expression, or other non-verbal cues, I tend to write in a more descriptive or formal way. And I’m able to add punctuation to emphasize and separate ideas to aid in understanding. If I had scripted this particular story, I likely would have been more specific in some ways to avoid parts of oral speaking that don’t translate well to written text without punctuation, such as side comments or thoughts. I would have been able to put in clearer transitions between ideas to help the reader understand when one thought started and another ended. At the same time, some of the other mistakes would have still been present and made it a challenge to fully understand.  

• In what ways does oral storytelling differ from written storytelling? 

Oral storytelling to me is much richer, more beautiful and personal than a written story. This comes from the voices, expressions, pauses, volume changes and non-verbal cues that aren’t transferable to a static page and instead rely on the reader to add them in. It’s one of the reasons that one of the Indigenous advocates at our school says that it’s hard to read an Indigenous story, and so much richer to hear it from an Elder as they put in all of those extra pieces to bring the story to life and emphasize the meaning that they are trying to present. 

This task has made me wonder if memory has decreased because of the written word. I thought of this because of the example that Boroditsky uses about the innate ability of a group of indigenous Australians who are able to point in any cardinal direction, which is a skill developed based on what was important in that culture. I wonder about Indigenous peoples here on Turtle Island who used oral traditions and stories for their teachings (2011). Would their memories have been much better than the colonizers who relied on written language? I often find it hard to remember details of events or trips unless I’ve jotted something down to remind myself or taken photos. It’s like the story is there, but I depend on written hints or photos to bring it to the forefront. Is oral storytelling a way to practice imprinting stories, lessons, ideas in our heads without being able to rely on “looking things up” later.  I feel I remember a story told to me in a different way than something I’ve read.  

References:

Boroditsky, L. (2011). How language shapes thought. Scientific American, 304(2), 62-65.

Ong, Walter, J. Taylor & Francis eBooks – CRKN, & CRKN MiL Collection. (2002). Orality and literacy: The technologizing of the word. New York; London: Routledge.